Salvationist - August 2015

Page 20

From Addict to Graduate After years lost to crystal meth addiction, Ben Capili found new purpose at Booth University College BY KRISTIN OSTENSEN, STAFF WRITER

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Identity Theft Born in the Philippines, Capili and his family immigrated to Canada, settling in Winnipeg, when he was a year old. When their qualifications were not recognized in Canada, his parents struggled to provide for their family. The effects of poverty hit Capili harder as he grew older. “As the youngest of six kids, I wore hand-me-downs— sometimes they were from my sisters so I would go to school in girls’ clothes,” he remembers. “I was trying to form an identity and kept getting rejected everywhere I went. I was really lonely.” 20 • August 2015 • Salvationist

Photo: Dan Harper

et out or you’re going to die.” Ben Capili scanned the basement apartment where he was squatting with his girlfriend. There was no one in sight. Yet he was sure he heard it—a clear, audible voice. With those words echoing in his mind, Capili suddenly felt the weight of his surroundings—the pain in his stomach a symptom of crystal meth withdrawal, the empty apartment a reminder of the rival who had just robbed him of everything he owned. “That moment when I heard that voice was the single greatest moment of my life,” Capili reflects. “I believe that God was speaking to me. And I didn’t deserve that—I did nothing for God to talk to me.” Wearing only the clothes on his back, Capili got up and left. “I was a crying mess,” he remembers. “I didn’t know what I was going to do; I was just wandering the streets.” Yet as he walked the streets of Winnipeg on that cold December day, eventually making his way to the Addictions Foundation of Manitoba, Capili had an underlying sense of peace. “Despite coming to this recognition that my life was a terrible mess and that I needed to do something, but didn’t know what, I knew it was going to be OK.” In high school, Capili started skipping class to avoid being bullied and went to an arcade where he found a place among other misfits. “This was a group of people who accepted me,” he says. “We’d go to someone’s place and, at first, we were just drinking alcohol, but then it progressed. Over the years that became my identity.” Capili went to five different high schools before dropping out completely. He took work where he could find it, but rarely held on to a job for long. “When I got money, I didn’t know how to handle

it so I would go to parties,” he says. “I got into cocaine, acid, ecstasy and eventually crystal meth.” From the moment he tried meth at the age of 25, he was completely addicted. On the Run The next 10 years of Capili’s life were a drug-fuelled blur. As his addictions grew stronger, Capili stole and committed fraud to support his habits. “I would use my older brother’s resumé to get jobs,” he shares. “I had no idea what I was doing but it didn’t matter because,


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